The Ram TRX is noted for the enormous 6.2-liter supercharged V8 engine and its ridiculous amount of power. Although it lives up to its namesake in the sense that it’s big and powerful, a recently run drag race in the desert may suggest that it lives up to its name in another way, too.
Edmunds, in its latest drag race video, decided to run the Ram TRX against the Rivian R1T on a sandy, dusty, desert surface in order to find out if the newfangled EV can take on the old school pickup on its home turf.
Although the Ram looks a little more aggressive thanks to its bulging wheel arches, snarling hood vents, and big tire, it’s actually down on power as compared to the Rivian. Whereas the V8 makes 702 hp (524 kW/712 PS) and 650 lb-ft (881 Nm) of torque, the Rivian makes 835 hp (623 kW/847 PS) and 908 lb-ft (1,231 Nm) of torque.
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The only advantage the Ram TRX might have is in top speed but for this test, Edmunds is just measuring 0-60 times and quarter-mile times. In both the standing quarter-mile race and the rolling race, designed to correct for some of the EV’s instant torque advantage, the Rivian walks away with it, beating the Ram TRX easily.
The result prompts the Ram’s driver to say that it feels impressive “until you line it up next to a Rivian. Then you just feel kind of big and dumb.”
On dirt, with all-terrain tires, the Ram TRX is capable of going from 0-60 mph (96 km/h) in an impressive 4.7 seconds and, in the same conditions, the Rivian hits that speed in 3.8 seconds. They both also set quarter-mile times that would be respectable on the tarmac, with the TRX finishing the sprint in 13.2 seconds and the R1T finishing it in 12.4 seconds.
Although both pickups impress in this test, Ram TRX owners might start feeling less like the T-Rexes of the Cretaceous period and more like the T-Rexes of today: extinct.
